Here is a more detailed article about the situation in and around Kampala: http://www.monitor.co.ug/artman/publish/news/10_feared_dead_in_city_riots12_91137.shtml [View Full Entry]

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I'm sure this isn't even making a blip in the news in the U.S., but there have been some isolated riots here in Kampala in the last couple of days. The Kabaka (king) of Buganda was planning a visit to an area of his kingdom known as Kayunga. There is a minority group there called the Banyala who want to secede from the kingdom or, actually, claim they were never a part of it. The government has gotten involved, siding against the Kabaka, which has ticked off the Baganda. Some also claim that the president has been channeling money to the [View Full Entry]

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Can you have religion without hate? The church, here in Uganda, has taken another big step towards increasing the amount of hate in the world. There is a witch hunt going on now for gay people. That's right - in a country where people die daily of HIV, malnutrition and malaria, people are rising up to combat the horrible evil of homosexuality. This country can't rise up as a unified population to fight corruption, which affects them on a daily basis and keeps them from getting badly needed services, and it can't train teachers. However, it can mobilize people in an [View Full Entry]

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“The problem we Africans have is that when we see you people with light skin, we admire you and we want to have what you have. We want to walk in your shoes - but we want them to be your shoes. We don't want to know where you got them so that we can work to get a pair of our own.” These were the words of a philosopher in the guise of a waiter at the cafe I went to this morning. I have so many thoughts about what he said, especially given that my day began with two [View Full Entry]

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(by Devin) Language can illustrate so much about a culture. Eskimos who have an intimate relationship with the Arctic have more than a dozen words for snow. In India, there is no word in which a woman can be possessive of a man (“my man” becomes “I belong to that man” in Hindi) except when she is speaking of a slave or servant. And in Uganda, I came across a new word recently that made me think deeply about the differences between Uganda and the US. I was giving several of my office colleagues a ride downtown after work one steaming [View Full Entry]

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For those of you who have been waiting patiently for more Simmy... [View Full Entry]

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I'm rarely at a loss for words. We've been back a week, though, and I still don't know what to write. What is there to say that hasn't already been said? It was important to visit the memorials - it made it feel so much more personal and brought the scale of it home to us. At the memorial centre in Kigali, more than 250,000 of the 1 million victims are buried, and more are added each year as their remains are found. This genocide was different from the others in this century. And there have been far too many in [View Full Entry]

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I'm sitting on the floor of a seedy hotel room, feeling the vibration of the night club that we had no idea existed under our hotel. We are halfway through our time in Rwanda and we have not yet visited a genocide memorial site. I wanted to write this post tonight, before we visit the genocide museum here in Kigali tomorrow. Why? It all comes down to the Museum of the Native American in Washington D.C. When I visited there two years ago, I was powerfully struck by one thing about it. One thing that was very intentional on the parts [View Full Entry]

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I'm guessing this isn't getting a lot of press in the U.S., but I think it is actually pretty significant. Do you remember Colonel Gaddafi of Libya? Yep, the one we used to hear so much about a few decades ago? Well, he's still in power after 40 years. Even though he's dropped off the radar of most American media, he continues to play a strong role in Africa. Here in Uganda a few years ago, he financed the construction of a new National Mosque. According to Austin Ejiet, a writer for The Monitor, he has also “had a hand in [View Full Entry]

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YAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And how about Aretha Franklin for Minister of Cool?!? [View Full Entry]

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